Deliberative democracy (DD) first developed as a challenger to political exclusions in liberal democracy, enacted through electoral-representative institutions. Theorists argued that structural inequalities and aggregative methods failed to comply with the mandate of inclusion at the core of the democratic norm. Deliberation would amend those shortcomings by centering inclusive dialogue and considered judgement in political engagement. Yet the very field of DD is founded on exclusions, having developed primarily from the work of theorists from the global north, and focusing on cases in the global north. Such bias ignores the breadth and variety of deliberative histories, theories, and practices from the global south.
This article contributes to correcting this partial historicization by examining how deliberative practices from the global south enact the mandate of inclusion. I argue that global south deliberation is used as part of wider participatory repertoires with the goal of entrenching liberal democratic values. This argument is constructed through a grounded normative theory analysis of empirical data provided by Demo.Reset, a project that led an online survey, twelve focus groups, and five generative workshops with 108 global organizations across 22 countries in the global south. The analysis shows how respondents incorporate deliberation to, first, promote pluralism, and second, enable collective action. The article concludes with two implications that derive from this research agenda: first, the complementarity of these results with established lines of inquiry in DD, and second, a call for attention against the ‘romanticization’ of global south practices.
